The former Brexit Secretary also hit out at Germany’s Angela Merkel as he accused the duo of taking an anti-British line.

But he picked out France for the sternest criticsm as Theresa May’s Chequers plan facing being scrapped leaving Britain heading for a no-deal scenario.

In an interview with the Evening Standard, Mr Davis picked out France as Britain’s biggest hurdle in getting a good Brexit deal.

He said: “Number one, they are the most committed to the, ‘you cannot be seen to succeed argument because it will encourage other people’.

“It’s a daft argument, frankly. There is nobody like us, in truth, nobody has the upside we have, the upside of the rest of the world.

“The second reason is a very, very narrow French one of trying, as it were, to raid our economy to get businesses to go to France.

“Best demonstrator of that is the special tax deals they have given to some hedge fund people and other big earners in the City … at least one person whose salary last year was hundreds of millions and who paid no tax on it because he’s based in Paris now.”

Mr Davis added France also views Athe UK as having a “deruglatory ‘Wild West’ Anglo-Saxon approach to economics” threatening Europe by out-competing them with lowering tax.

Mr Davis also said Mrs Merkel was never “really going to be our champion”.

The ex-cabinet minister was speaking just days after penning a letter critical of Mrs May’s Chequers Plan.

He accused the Prime Minister of having a “constant drumbeat” for her proposal, when there were “clearly… at least two alternatives”.